Over the last week or so I’ve been counting down my favourite 10 goals, games and players of 2008. You can see the results here.

But in the interests of fairness and balance I thought it only right to reflect on some of the low points of 2008 too and use them as new year’s resolutions for 2009…

1. If the January transfer window proves frustrating, don’t panic buy third-rate Championship strikers like Grzegorz Rasiak.

2. Don’t allow fans to pay hundreds of pounds for a Uefa Cup tie at Sporting Lisbon and then put out a reserve team (OK, so we’re unlikely to see much European action in 2009, but a bit of effort in the FA Cup would be a good place to start).

3. Don’t lose 3-2 to Arsenal when you were 2-0 up and playing against 10 men.

4. If you’re fighting for your lives at the bottom of the table, don’t get battered 4-0 at Aston Villa.

5. If you think you need another centre-half in the squad, don’t waste £2 million on third-rate Championship defenders like Danny Shittu.

6. If you fail in the FA Cup, let’s have a bash at the Carling Cup… therefore don’t capitulate at home with a half-hearted effort against lower league teams like Northampton.

7. Don’t play Kevin Nolan, Gavin McCann, Joey O’Brien and Fabrice Muamba all in the same midfield at the same time ever again.

8. If you do play them, expect that your negativity may prompt some fans to call you names and question your ability to do your job.

9. If it’s 0-0 against Everton at home after 80 minutes, consider making a substitution.

10. Don’t assume that defeat is inevitable against the top four.

Share your own Bolton Wanderers new year’s resolutions in the comment box below.

The draw for the third round of the FA Cup takes place today at 2.15pm. Wanderers have been given the lucky number seven in the draw.

Recent results have bought Gary Megson enough time for us to now assume that he will still be manager of Bolton Wanderers by the time the third round comes round in January.

And after last season’s surrender at Sporting Lisbon in the Uefa Cup, when Megson fielded a weakened team, the FA Cup will give him a chance to redeem himself with supporters.

There really are no excuses this time, with no Uefa Cup commitments and after being dumped out of the Carling Cup by Northampton at the earliest opportunity.

Portsmouth’s success in the competition last season should give hope to clubs like Bolton that they do have a chance of winning it too.

Personally, I would rather win the FA Cup and be relegated than finish 10th and get knocked out of the Cup in the third round, but I know the board won’t see it like that for financial reasons.

But the board have also shown great willingness to reconnect with the needs of the fans this season, so let’s hope Phil Gartside instructs Megson to go for it regardless of where we are in the league come January.

After all, the defeat at Wigan following the Lisbon surrender demonstrated that resting players is no guarantee of winning the next game.

It’s a long time since we had a decent Cup run (eight years?), and taking the Cup seriously would give Megson a good way of differentiating himself from Sam Allardyce, who always saw the FA Cup as secondary once we got into the Premier League.

It might just win over a few more fans too, especially those who have found it hard to forgive him for his team selection in Lisbon.

Do you want Bolton to take the FA Cup seriously this season? Have your say in the comments below.

And in case Gary needs a reminder of the romance of the Cup, here it is…

[youtube=http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=Pldp3vIhHME]

Tapping the phone call between Gary Megson and Rob Styles on Monday, when the whistle-happy referee phoned the Bolton Wanderers manager to apologise for giving Manchester United a penalty on Saturday, would have made interesting listening.

Megson made it clear after the game on Saturday that he was only interested in an apology from Styles if it was a public one. He said:

I don’t want him to ring me up. I would have more respect from him if he just holds his hands up and says he was wrong.

As Gordon Sharrock points out in The Bolton News, keeping the apology private suggests Styles is trying to save his own neck rather than clearing the air in any meaningful way.

Nevertheless, I would have thought that Megson is the last man to pass judgment on Styles when it comes to taking responsibility for your actions.

Perhaps Megson would like to show Styles how it’s done by making a public apology for the following:

1. Fielding an under-strength team against Sporting Lisbon last season when thousands of Wanderers fans had paid hundreds of pounds to travel to Portugal in the hope of seeing their team progress in the Uefa Cup.

2. Allowing his team to be knocked out of the Carling Cup without even a hint of a fight against Northampton earlier this season.

3. Continuing to play Gavin McCann when Mustapha Riga has looked about a million times better on the rare occasions he’s been given a chance.

4. Criticising the fans for making mountains out of mole hills.

5. Criticising the players for being ‘one dimensional’, despite the fact that he picks a teams with three defensive midfielders in them.

There’s probably more. Feel free to add your own in the comments below…

Share this story on Facebook, Digg etc…

Here’s what the Bolton Wanderers message boards made of the 0-0 home draw with West Bromwich Albion…

- Four points from three games represents a terrible start to the season, especially given the standard of the opposition.

- Gary Megson was a coward for blaming the players’ ‘one-dimensional approach’ on Sky Sports, when surely he’s the one telling them to play like that. Does anyone still have faith in Bolton’s so-called manager? Megson is the sole reason why 8,000 Bolton Wanderers fans continue to stay away from the Reebok Stadium.

- With better finishing West Brom would have won at a canter. Bolton were embarrassed by their superior passing, just like we were by Northampton. In fact, we were absolutely dismal, but the referee didn’t help by being totally inconsistent.

- A midfield of Kevin Nolan, Gavin McCann, Joey O’Brien and Fabrice Muamba is far too negative and needs changing quickly if we’re going to have any chance of staying up. McCann is particularly awful, so bad in fact that some are considering suspending their support for the club until he is out of the team.

- We have no attacking flair. Mustapha Riga was only bought to appease fans over the sale of El-Hadji Diouf and he’ll never get enough of a look-in to make a difference. Riga and Ricardo Gardner were supposed to give width but we didn’t give them the ball. We were also completely ineffective up front.

- At the end of the day, we get what we deserve because the board have still not full reinvested the money we got from the sale of Nicolas Anelka.

- Still, the good news is that Bolton are bound to get at least 0 points from their next four games.

Or, alternatively…

- The negative comments concentrate too much on the result and not enough on the performance. Jussi Jaaskelainen, Riga, Gardner and Danny Shittu all played really well, and the second-half performance in particular really wasn’t that bad.

- We’ll be alright once we get Johan Elmander back, especially once he teams up with new signing Ebi Smolarek.

And finally…

- Given the amount of action and controversy in the game, the BBC’s coverage on Match of the Day was an insult (again). It’s time Bolton Wanderers fans boycotted Match of the Day.

What did you think? Let us know using the comment box below…

Social Bookmarks:

Since taking over as manager of Bolton Wanderers last season, Gary Megson has made constant reference in interviews to the state the club was in when he arrived. His favourite line is ‘five points from 10 games tells its own story.’

This is the same as the Labour government making constant reference to the state the country was in when they took over from the Tories in 1997. It’s a thinly-veiled excuse for their own shortcomings. They may as well say ‘look, however bad you think this is now, at least it’s not as bad as it was then.’

So it was no surprise to hear Megson using his favourite line again this week after the Carling Cup defeat to Northampton. The problem for Megson, though, is that the point at which his record can be judged against Sammy Lee’s is rapidly approaching.

So far we have three points from two games, so in theory Megson has seven games (one of the 10 games he mentions was under caretaker boss Archie Knox, so Lee actually only had nine) to get at least two more points and avoid putting the club in exactly the same situation we were in 12 months ago.

Shouldn’t be too difficult, right? Not necessarily. If Bolton don’t beat West Brom today, Megson will come under tremendous pressure already, especially with much tougher games against Arsenal, Manchester United, Tottenham, Everton and Blackburn coming up before his nine-game deadline expires.

And don’t forget that the Wanderers’ one league win under Lee also came in the first four games of the season We were also still in the Carling and Uefa Cups when Lee left, which at least gave the fans something to look forward to. Megson will have no such luxury.

So, no pressure against West Brom today, Gary…

Social Bookmarks: